


Family Circle

by Eve_Levine



Category: Sons of Anarchy
Genre: Drawing With Kids, Family Fluff, Repeating History, Tara is a Painter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:54:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24069970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eve_Levine/pseuds/Eve_Levine
Summary: “Okay, you hold the crayon and I’ll hold you, and Abel and Mama can make a fish together.”Tara could almost feel the ghost of her own young hand, sitting small and clumsy inside the warm and steady grip of her mother’s, as Tara guided Abel’s little one across the paper.Set a month before the start of Season 4.
Relationships: Tara Knowles & Abel Teller, Tara Knowles/Jax Teller
Comments: 7
Kudos: 15





	Family Circle

**Author's Note:**

> This bit of fluff popped into my head when I got a good look at the new décor in the Teller-Knowles house at the beginning of season 4. I was fascinated by the paintings, the easel, the scribbled kid drawings, and the suspiciously good ;-) "kid drawings." It looks like the writers intended to make Tara a painter, but alas the dangling plot thread was left un-pulled. Oh well, that's what fanfic is for. 
> 
> This was written ages ago and originally posted at FF.net

“What shape do you make the dog’s head?” Tara’s mom asks from her spot in front of her easel.

“Triangle,” Tara answers. She’s sitting at the coffee table in their living room, sketch pad and crayons spread out before her.

“Okay, now what about his body?”

“It’s an oval,” Tara replies.

“Don’t forget about the four rectangles for legs,” her mom continues, and Tara feels all of the impatience and bravado of a seven year old artist well up inside of her.

“But a dog isn’t just all those shapes mixed together, Mama. It’s harder than that to make it look right.”

“I know baby, but when you’re new to drawing, you have to start with the basic shapes. Once you have those, you can adjust them to look however you want. You have to learn how to see before you can learn how to draw.”

Tara has no idea what that means, but she continues making her dog until her mom peeks over her shoulder.

“Why’d you make him brown, baby?” She asks. “You don’t like brown.”

“Most dogs are brown,” Tara shrugs and her mom smiles at her.

“The water is always blue and the leaves are always green for you, aren’t they?” Her mom lays a kiss on Tara’s forehead. “This mind in here is brilliant, and very literal.”

***

“Damn it. I’m making hotel art,” Tara sighs to herself as she stares at the half finished canvas on the easel in her dining room. It’s her mother’s easel, dug out of the piles in her father’s house. Tara set it up shortly after Jax went inside, after Wendy signed over custody of Abel and Tara was learning how to take care of him by herself. Back when her belly was getting rounder, when she was trying to sweep away the horror of the last few months and find a sense of peace. Tara doesn’t really have a lot of time for peaceful moments, but she manages to carve out a couple of minutes every few days to paint.

Abel, whose naps are shorter than Thomas’, likes to color. A few months back he began pulling his coloring books and his crayons over to her easel, and sitting down next to her. Tara couldn’t say why, but seeing him stretched out on the floor, leaving haphazard streaks of color across his paper, and looking up every so often to seek her approval, created an ache deep in her marrow for her own mother.

She finally understood that ache the day Abel grew frustrated with his hands, when he couldn’t get the picture on his paper to match the picture in his head. He tossed his book in disappointment and didn’t want to draw or color anymore. Tara found herself smiling at him, scooping him up book and all, and heading for the kitchen table. She plopped him into her lap, and shook all of the crayons out of the box.

“Do you want Mama to help?” Tara asked him, and when Abel nodded, she handed him a red crayon.

Then the memory hit her. It was old, hazy, and covered in gauze. It was one of her earliest. This was what her mother used to do with her, when she was Abel’s age, and she wanted to draw pretty pictures.

“What do you want to make, baby?” Tara asked, blinking back tears.

“Fish,” Abel answered, and Tara took his hand in hers.

“Okay, you hold the crayon and I’ll hold you, and Abel and Mama can make a fish together.”

Tara could almost feel the ghost of her own young hand, sitting small and clumsy inside the warm and steady grip of her mother’s, as Tara guided Abel’s little one across the paper. And listening to Abel’s peals of excitement for the fish swimming out of their fingertips and into his book, repeating this ritual with him, transformed the longing ache for her mother into something softer, something sweet, something to look forward to.

Abel hasn’t decided which hand he’s going to favor, switching hands to suit his mood, and he has no interest in realistic colors. His pumpkins can be purple and his grapes can be orange. And Tara’s trying to learn a thing or two from Abel as she mixes up her color palette, because what bugs her about her own paintings is their precision. They’re pretty and controlled, and the best ones go on the wall, but there’s a messy chaos inside her head that never quite makes it to the canvas. Her soul isn’t peeking out in her art, and that makes it safe. Tara knows in art, that “safe” really means boring.

Abel wanders into the living room, carrying his blanket and his box of crayons, and Tara smiles to herself because she’s found him more than once sleeping with that box wrapped in his arms like it was a teddy bear.

Wanna play?” Abel asks as he rubs his eyes.

“Sure, baby,” Tara answers, and leaves her painting to pick him up and take him into the kitchen. She and Abel settle together on one of the kitchen chairs. “Do you want to color or do you want to draw?” Tara asks, and Abel decides he wants them both to draw on the same page.

“Abel draw Mama,” he declares. When Tara asks who she should draw, he pats his chest and says, “Abel.” 

“Should I add Thomas?” Tara wants to know, and Abel nods continuing his work.

“What about Daddy?” Tara asks after she puts the finishing touches on the little bean shaped bundle meant to be Thomas. Abel’s shoulders slump and his hands fall into his lap.

“Daddy gone,” Abel says sadly. Tara feels like she should have seen this coming when they started the family picture. Abel is so young and their weekly visits at the prison have become his norm, his reality. She knows he’s a resilient kid, and he seems to accept that he only gets to see Daddy on Saturdays, but as the months pass and Abel’s awareness grows, they need to talk it through every so often.

“We’re going to see Daddy tomorrow,” Tara reassures him and cuddles Abel closer to her.

“Want Daddy here. Abel want Daddy now,” Abel whimpers, and Tara feels a new kind of ache. It’s not the ache of a child for her mother, it’s the ache of a mother for her child. She runs her hand over his hair and kisses his temple. Then she folds down, and wraps herself around him, so she can talk quietly in his ear.

“I know you do, baby. Mama misses him too, but he’ll be home soon, and then he’ll be here every day. Would you like that?” She asks, and Abel’s hand reaches up to twirl the ends of her hair.

“When,” he implores, and Tara doesn’t know how to begin to explain the concept of one more month to a toddler.

“Before you know it, Abel,” is the best she comes up with and Tara feels like that isn’t good enough. She needs to get a smile out of her little guy. “I have an idea. Do you want to finish the picture and then maybe give it to Daddy when we see him tomorrow?”

Abel nods and sits up, squirming out of the hug. The moment of sadness passes as quickly as it arrived. Abel’s eyes are lit up with excitement when he cranes his neck back to look at her. “Mama, you help,” he orders, reaching for his crayons again.

“What do you say?” Tara prompts automatically, and she smiles when she get the correct response.

“Please.”

“Thank you, baby. I can help with Daddy.” Tara gestures to the crayons spread out around them. “Now, what color is Daddy’s hair?”

“Blue!” Abel nearly shouts. Tara hushes him and muffles her laughter so they don’t wake up Thomas. 

“Daddy’s hair is yellow,” she can’t resist correcting, as she holds up the yellow crayon for Abel to see. “But you can make his hair any color you want. Daddy might like to see himself with blue hair.” She grabs the light blue and the dark blue crayons and holds them up in front of Abel. “Which one do you want to use for Daddy’s hair?” She asks, and Abel taps her hand holding the light blue one. Tara hands him the light blue crayon and nestles Abel’s little hand inside her own. Like always he is delighted by their picture flowing out onto the paper.

“Abel and Mama make best pictures,” Abel boasts happily and Tara kisses his temple again.

“Yes we do. Okay baby, Daddy needs a head under all of that blue hair. What shape is Daddy’s head?”

Abel bounces for a second on her lap, thinking through the answer. Tara helps him out a little, tapping on the faces of the already drawn figures of herself and Abel.

“Circle!” He says with triumph, and even if it sounds more like “charcoal” than “circle,” Tara knows what he means.

Abel wiggles from side to side as Tara congratulates him, but then he goes very still when they press the crayon back into the paper. His concentration shows in the little tongue poking out of the side of his mouth. Tara nuzzles her cheek into the crown of his head, as she and Abel complete the circle.


End file.
